Code names, outside monitor ensured fairness

Apr. 25, 2013

Conceptual Bridge Design for the New Tappan Zee Bridge. / New York Thruway Authority

Written by

Theresa Juva-Brown and Khurram Saeed

TARRYTOWN — The process of selecting a winning bidder for the new Tappan Zee Bridge was so stringent that each contender’s identity was kept secret with code names — including at one point members of the Beatles — used to represent them instead.

Meanwhile, independent monitors from a company called Thacher Associates watched over the process, confirming that last year’s top-secret deliberations were conducted with “high levels of integrity,” new documents reveal.

After months of discussion, a committee of 12 people made up of construction experts and local leaders recommended Tappan Zee Constructors for the job last fall. In December, the New York State Thruway Authority board approved a $3.1 billion deal with the joint venture to design and build a new 3-mile crossing by April 2018.

The Thruway Authority released the full report of the Blue Ribbon Selection Committee along with hundreds of pages of Thacher’s findings Thursday after The Journal News filed a Freedom of Information Law request.

The documents give a behind-the-scenes look at how Tappan Zee Constructors was chosen to lead one of the largest public works projects in state history.

The selection committee’s report lays out what it called the “superior elements” of TZC’s bid. Some of them are familiar, such as the need to dredge less of the riverbed, but some never have been made public. For example, the main span deck on the new crossing will be specially built for “resiliency under extreme events.”

The two other bidders, Tappan Zee Bridge Partners and Kiewit-Skanska-Weeks Joint Venture, were passed over because the committee determined that TZC provided “the best value” to taxpayers. TZC’s bid cost $848 million less than the next-closest proposal and required the least time to build.

The Thruway Authority hired Thacher Associates, a consultant with 16 years of experience, to ensure the selection committee was working to get the best bridge at the best price and that the panel’s review compiled with state and federal laws, state officials told The Journal News on Thursday. The Thruway Authority paid Thacher $325,000 for its month of monitoring services.

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“The most critical element was the integrity, security and fairness of the entire selection process,” said Brian Conybeare, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s special adviser on the project. “It is all part of the ongoing commitment from the Thruway Authority to make this the most transparent infrastructure project in New York state history.”

Selection committee members David Aukland and Allen Biehler on Thursday said the team worked well together. They also praised the Thruway Authority.

“They were very, very careful to present to the committee all the materials needed for us to reach the conclusion” we did, said Aukland, a Tarrytown Planning Board member.

Biehler, who led the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation from 2003 to 2011, said members had open minds because they didn’t know which team produced each proposal. He said the state worked hard to redact names and other key information to conceal the bidders’ identities.

“It was completely blind,” said Biehler, a transportation professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.